It has to be said, I’ve never been one to crave the “next big gadget”, or to follow the crowd when it comes to following particular trends. But if I was to buy myself a stock as a long-overdue Christmas present to myself, I struggle to look further than one of the most popular among Fools and other investors alike – GlaxoSmithKline (LSE: GSK) (NYSE: GSK.US).
Yes, as it’s a gift to myself I could have speculated a little and moved for a slightly sexier small-cap growth stock, but there’s one thing that the pharma giant can offer my portfolio that most of my other holdings can’t: a great dividend. Since 2009, the dividend yield has hovered somewhere between 4.6% and 5.5%, with last year’s coming in at a very respectable 4.8%.
Now could be a good time to buy, too, in terms of the share price. It may have seen a steady rise to just under 1,500 since its October low of 1,324, but overall, the price is still down nearly 6% over the last 6 months. I could even consider that to be an early January bargain.
